The earrings in “On Her Knees” symbolize the power and carelessness of the wealthy, as they are the catalyst for the client’s unwarranted mistreatment of Carol. When the earrings go missing, the client is quick to accuse Carol of their theft and fire her, despite a lack of evidence. Like the client herself, the earrings aren’t actually present for most of the story, yet they dominate Carol and Victor’s thoughts and conversation. The two of them spend all week arguing about the final day of cleaning the client’s apartment and speculating about the client and the earrings. In this way, the earrings are an invisible but persistent reminder of the client’s control over the situation and her power over Carol’s good reputation.
When Victor accidentally discovers the missing earrings under the client’s bed, it becomes clear just how easy it would have been for the client to find them if she’d only looked. Carol concludes that the earrings must not have been very important to the client, though they as things played out they became vitally important to Carol. A pair of earrings that, to the client, weren’t even worth searching for, cost Carol a job and her spotless reputation. Once found, the earrings become a visible representation of how little the client cares—about her possessions, about searching for what she has lost, and about Carol or Carol’s years of service.
Initially, Victor plans to be as careless with the earrings as the client and throw them in the cat litter box to remain either sullied or, perhaps, forever lost. Ultimately, however, he removes them and leaves them on the counter for the client to find. The client may, as Carol believes, assume that Carol stole the earrings and then brought them back. In putting them in plain sight next to the payment that Carol refuses to take for her last day of cleaning, however, Victor forces the client to face her own behavior. There is a chance that the sight of the earrings along with the money will lead the client to the truth: that her carelessness lost her a good cleaner and her thoughtless power harmed an innocent woman.
The Earrings Quotes in On Her Knees
Then, even while I took a shower, she stood in the bathroom doorway to lecture me about personal pride. It was as though I was not a twenty-year-old law student but a little boy who needed his neck scrubbed. […]
But I was convinced that it was a mistake for her to go back. It was unfair, ludicrous, impossible, and while she packed the Corolla in the driveway I told her so.
I was curious. What kind of person would do this? After years of faultless service there was no discussion, just the accusation and the brusque termination in three scrawled lines.
Honestly, Mum, why didn’t we just give the place a light go through? Or better, just take the dough and split.
Because it would look like an admission of guilt.
Shit.
Language.
But this won’t convince her, Mum.
No, probably not.
You could report them missing yourself. Ask them to search our place. Force the issue. There’s nothing that can come of it.
Except talk. Imagine the talk. I’d lose the rest of my jobs.
Well, you’ve cleared your name. That’s something.
She shook her head with a furious smile.
Why not? I asked. Show her what we found, what she was too lazy to look for. Show her where they were.
All she has to say is that she made me guilty enough to give them back. That I just wanted to keep the job. To save my good name. Vic, that’s all I’ve got—my good name. These people, they can say anything they like. You can’t fight back.
In the kitchen I put the earrings beside the unstrung key and the thin envelope of money.
My mother stood silhouetted in the open doorway. It seemed that the very light of day was pouring out through her limbs. I had my breath back. I followed her into the hot afternoon.
The Earrings Symbol Timeline in On Her Knees
